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Friday, 3 November 2017

When You Can't Move On From A Life Event

It's been two years since Nathan Green was convicted of paedophilia and was sentenced to 18 months suspended sentence for two years. It's been two long years of trying to put our lives back together again and two even longer years of not knowing where my daughter actually lives and whether he moves her again.

Sometimes I wonder if I just need to do the English thing and man up, just forget it and move on. That's what we English actually do best. But then something drags me down and I remember everything that I have lost. I remember what he took from us and how he has left my family with a huge gap in our life. Bethany was never an easy child as she grew up, she was (is) very stubborn and yearned to be loved by people all the time. We tried to warn her about Nathan but I took my eye off the ball and she slipped through the net. It's so easy to be groomed when you want to be loved. I know we need to move on because he doesn't deserve any more of our life. Everytime my phone rings and it's an unknown answer, I am too scared to answer it because I am scared it is a call to say my daughter is hurt, dead or something awful has happened. We have all seen the Coronation Street storyline and we all have seen how girls are drawn into a trap and some are just 'got rid off'. That storyline was portrayed so well and it was so heartbreaking to watch as the characters were called Beth and Nathan.

Remember this face, it could save a child in the future

Tilly still has nightmares that Nathan is coming for her, she asks me how I can keep her safe when I couldn't keep her sister safe and I let her go. That's like a stab in the heart but at the same time, it's how she sees it. A mother should protect her children with all of her heart - I didn't. She asks me what will happen when Nathan finds her online and as much as I try to reassure her that he will never come near her, she still thinks he will find a way. The thing is Nathan Green is scared of me, He knows that I won't be violent towards him, he knows that I won't risk losing Tilly over violence. But he also knows that I have the power of word! As he was actually convicted of being a paedophile, I can scream about it from the rooftops and a recent post on my Facebook page reached about 1/2 million people. This is bringing awareness because he is a danger not only to the people local to him but also to anyone on the internet.

I found his twitter account about 8 months ago and contacted the police because I didn't know if they were aware he was still using social media and his account was locked down, so I couldn't access the details. I was 'assured' that his internet usage was monitored, but how can you do this? How can anyone ever monitor internet usage when you can access the internet from so many different places like public libraries, internet cafes, mobile phones and tablets? It's so easy to hide internet usage from people!

Tilly has been left with some real emotional problems and I actually thought that as she was so young when it all happened (she was 5 at the time), then she would forget all about it. I knew she would never forget her sister and we made so many wrong choices when we tried to protect her. We chose not to tell her and we still choose not to tell her the extremities of his crimes, but at the time we couldn't explain where her sister had gone and why the baby that her sister was carrying, was no longer there. This actually led Tilly to think that her sister had died, I remember her coming to me in tears and asking me if Beth was dead. It wasn't until she learnt the story of the chick and the wolf that I realised she was ready to hear a fairy story version of the truth. I simply told her that Nathan pretended to be nice and he wasn't in real life. But Beth had trusted him and fallen in love with him. She asked about the baby and I told her that the baby went to live with a new family who would protect her and look after her. She seemed happy with the half-baked truth that I told her and to this day she still doesn't know he is a paedophile because she is still too young to understand it.

Somebody recently asked me why I rely on the internet so much, when it was part of tearing my life apart and why do I let Tilly use it. Tilly has an Instagram account and YouTube channel, but both of these are run by me. Both have passwords that she cant get onto and she wouldn't even know the URL for Instagram, let alone upload a picture. The reason she uses the internet is that I don't want her to be scared of the internet. To her, the internet is a bad place but we need the internet every day of our lives and she needs to learn to use the internet safely, rather than be forever afraid of it.

Tilly has had to learn the dangers of the internet at a young age, she has had to cope with so much sadness at such a young age. Now she talks about it matter of factly as she obviously understands more as she is getting older, she is making more sense of it in her mind now and I will always wonder if we have done the right or wrong thing by not telling her the truth when it first happened. She is a clever kid and I am sure, probably understands more than I could ever think she knows. But time is moving on and it is getting easier as time goes on. Tilly still struggles with anxiety, She doesn't know where Beth is. Her brother is now married and lives in Holland and her sister, Kim lives in town but comes to visit about 4 times a week. I have seen the bond between them grow (although Kim would say different) and Tilly panics whenever people go away because she is worried that she won't see them again. This is why I love that we live in an age of video calling because it has become such an important part of our life. Tilly can then see that everyone is still okay when they are not with her.

As for me, I will NEVER EVER forgive Nathan Green for the damage he has caused for his perverted kicks. He is a paedophile and I will make sure that the world knows what he is. I will continue to make sure that I raise awareness and hopefully protect another child online. This man has no morals at all and he is a danger to children. I will continue to make myself heard until the day he takes his dying breath, then hopefully my nightmare will be over.

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About Me

My name is Vicky and I am a 40 something mum to four kids aged 24, 22, 20 and the baby who is 6 years old. My blog is a wide variety of things that happen in my life and I would like to welcome you all to it. Please take a read and we welcome comments. if you want to work with us, please pop over to the media kit and contact us.